Essentials of Criminal Justice - 6e - c 08, Angielskie [EN](4)(2)
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P
ART
3
Courts and Adjudication
M
ike Nifong was the Durham County prosecutor when members of
the Duke University lacrosse team were accused of rape. At first,
Nifong was hailed as a hero, a local prosecutor who had the guts
to go after rich white males and bring them to justice for raping a poor
black woman. As the case began to unwind, Nifong was accused of
being out of control, a prosecutor exploiting racial tensions with a
trumped-up charge. The players’ claims of innocence were supported by
DNA tests and other exculpatory evidence, and all charges were eventu-
ally dropped. What really happened in the case? Critics suggest that
Nifong was up for reelection and one of his opponents was African
American. His conduct of the case was an attempt to gain votes in the
black community at the expense of justice. Nifong’s action will long be
debated, and this tale of wrongful prosecution will haunt the justice sys-
tem for quite some time. On December 28, 2006, the North Carolina bar
filed ethics charges against Nifong accusing him of making public state-
ments that were “prejudicial to the administration of justice” and of
engaging in “conduct involving dishonesty, fraud, deceit, or misrepresen-
tation.” On January 24, 2007, the North Carolina State Bar filed more
charges against Nifong for withholding evidence, a “systematic abuse of
prosecutorial discretion . . . prejudicial to the administration of justice.”
Nifong was eventually required to serve a short jail term.
8 COURTS,
PROSECUTION,
AND THE DEFENSE
9 PRETRIAL
PROCEDURES
10 THE CRIMINAL
TRIAL
11 PUNISHMENT AND
SENTENCING
The Duke rape case is one of a number of notorious cases that the U.S.
court system handles each year. In some instances, they receive the full
course of rights and processes guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution. In
others, prosecutors curtail their actions for want of evidence or because
a plea bargain has been struck. The chapters in this section cover the
court process. Chapter 8 reviews the structure of the courts and the role
of the judge, prosecution, and defense. Chapter 9 analyzes the pretrial
stage, including bail and plea bargaining. Chapter 10 covers the process
of the criminal trial and the legal rules that give it structure. Chapter 11
looks at criminal sentencing, including capital punishment.
■
237
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C
HAPTER
8
238
THE POLICE AND LAW ENFORCEMENT
Courts, Prosecution, and
the Defense
Chapter Outline
State Courts
Courts of Limited Jurisdiction
Courts of General Jurisdiction
Appellate Courts
Federal Courts
U.S. District Courts
U.S. Courts of Appeals
The U.S. Supreme Court
How a Case Gets to the Supreme Court
Federal and State Court Caseloads
The Judiciary
The Judge and the Justice System
Judicial Qualifications
The Prosecutor
Types of Prosecutors
Prosecutorial Discretion
Factors Influencing Prosecutorial
Discretion
The Role of Prosecutorial Discretion
Prosecutorial Ethics
The Defense Attorney
The Role of the Criminal Defense
Attorney
The Right to Counsel
Legal Services for the Indigent
The Private Bar
Does Type of Lawyer Matter?
The Competence of Defense Attorneys
Court Administration
Using Technology in Court Management
238
53247_08_Ch08_p237-271 pp3.indd 238
11/15/07 1:05:38 PM
239
POLICE IN SOCIETY: HISTORY AND ORGANIZATION
Chapter Objectives
1. Be familiar with the role of the court in
the justice process
2. Recognize the varying structures of
state and federal court systems
3. Understand the problems of court
overload
4. Describe the selection and duties of
the trial judge
5. Discuss the role and duties of
prosecutors
6. Be familiar with the pros and cons of
prosecutorial discretion
7. Understand the role of the defense
attorney in the justice process
8. Discuss the different forms of indigent
defense
9. Debate the pros and cons of private
attorneys
10. Be familiar with the expanding role of
technology in the court process
Key Themes
The court system is quite complex, and
each state has a unique court system.
The problem of court overload is a result
of the increase in legal cases outstripping
the court system’s ability to expand.
Selecting and retaining judges may be
more difficult than imagined.
Prosecutors maintain a great deal of dis-
cretion, most of which is hidden from the
general public they serve.
Though private attorneys get all the press,
most cases are handled by the indigent
defense system.
COBL
Profile
T
IM BAKKEN received his B.S. with majors
in English and psychology from the Univ-
ersity of Wisconsin–Stevens Point and
then went on to earn his J.D. (
juris doctor
)
in law and a master’s degree in counseling
from the University of Wisconsin–Madison.
After law school, Tim became an assistant
district attorney in New York City (Kings County/
Brooklyn), where he specialized in homicide pros-
ecutions. He enjoyed the adversarial system,
arguing with defense lawyers in court and
during trials, and was awed by his respon-
sibilities. A mistake could have grave
239
53247_08_Ch08_p237-271 pp3.indd 239
11/15/07 1:05:40 PM
240
PART 3
COURTS AND ADJUDICATION
consequences, as the smallest error could result in
someone evading justice and committing serious crimes
or in an innocent person going to prison.
After serving as a prosecutor, Tim worked for a law
firm in New York and then decided to pursue a career
teaching law. He enjoyed writing and creating, an essential
component of a professor’s career, as well as interac-
tions with students and professors. But his job is a little
different from most, because he teaches law at the U.S.
Military Academy at West Point. The mission of the
institution is to prepare students for service as officers
in the army and then for a “lifetime of service to the
nation.” The students he now teaches are somewhat
atypical from other college students because the
government covers all their expenses and even pays
them a salary. After graduation, all West Point students
must serve five years in the army, and all of them will
serve one or more tours in Iraq or Afghanistan.
Tim Bakken’s career illustrates the variety of options open to people who
choose legal careers. Some may start as public defenders and then go on to
the private sector, or—as in Tim’s case—move from prosecution to legal educa-
tion. Regardless of their career paths, most attorneys cut their teeth within the
court system.
The criminal court is the setting in which many of the most important
decisions in the criminal justice system are made. Eyewitness identification,
bail, trial, plea negotiations, and sentencing all involve court-made decisions.
The criminal court is a complex social agency with many independent but
interrelated subsystems: administrator, prosecutor, defense attorney, judge,
and probation department. The entire process—from filing the initial com-
plaint to final sentencing of the defendant—is governed by precise rules of law
designed to ensure fairness. However, in today’s crowded court system, such
abstract goals are often impossible to achieve. The nation’s court system is
chronically underbudgeted, and recent economic downturns have not helped
matters.
These constraints have a significant impact on the way courts carry out
justice. Quite often, the U.S. court system is the scene of accommodation and
“working things out,” rather than an arena for a vigorous criminal defense.
Plea negotiations and other nonjudicial alternatives, such as diversion, are far
more common than the formal trial process. Consequently, U.S. criminal jus-
tice can be selective. Discretion accompanies defendants through every step of
the process, determining what will happen to them and how their cases will
be resolved. “Discretion” means that two people committing similar crimes
may receive highly dissimilar treatment; most people convicted of homicide
receive a prison sentence, but about 5 percent receive probation as a sole sen-
tence; indeed, more murderers get probation than the death penalty.
1
In this chapter, we examine the structure and function of the court system.
The U.S. court system has evolved over the years into an intricately balanced
legal process. To house this complex process, each state maintains its own
state court organization and structure, and the federal court has an indepen-
dent trial court system. These are described next.
53247_08_Ch08_p237-271 pp3.indd 240
11/15/07 1:05:41 PM
241
CHAPTER 8
COURTS, PROSECUTION, AND THE DEFENSE
Mary Winkler talks with lead attorney Steve Farese, Sr.,
before being sentenced on June 8, 2007, in Selmer,
Tennessee. Winkler was convicted of voluntary
manslaughter for killing her preacher husband,
Matthew, in the parsonage where the family lived.
According to her statement, Mary and her husband had
been arguing throughout the evening about many
things, including family finances. She admitted some of
the problems were “her fault.” Furthermore, she said,
“He had really been on me lately criticizing me for
things—the way I walk, I eat, everything. It was just
building up to a point. I was tired of it. I guess I got to a
point and snapped.” The judge on the case sentenced
Mary Winkler to 210 days in prison. Because Mary was
credited for already serving 5 months, the judge
permitted her to spend the remaining 60 days in the
Western State Mental Health Facility. Is this sentence
sufficient for the murder of a spouse? Compare it with
the case of Scott Peterson, who received life in prison.
How can such disparity be justified?
STATE COURTS
Every state maintains its own court system. States are free to create as many
courts as they wish, name courts what they like (in New York, felony courts
are known as supreme courts!), and establish specialized courts that handle a
single legal matter, such as drug courts and/or domestic courts. Consequently,
no two court organizations are exactly alike. State courts handle a wide vari-
ety of cases and regulate numerous personal behaviors ranging from homicide
to property maintenance.
A great site for
court-related infor-
mation is the
National
Center for State Courts
.
Most state court sys-
tems have their own website;
Virginia’s state court system
and the National Center for
State Courts website can be
accessed via academic.cengage.
com/criminaljustice/siegel.
Courts of Limited Jurisdiction
Depending on the jurisdiction in which they are located,
state courts of
limited jurisdiction
are known by a variety of names—municipal courts,
county courts, district courts, and metropolitan courts, to name but a few.
They are known as courts of limited jurisdiction because they are restricted to
hearing minor or less serious civil and criminal cases.
Usually, courts of limited jurisdiction handle misdemeanor criminal
infractions, violations of municipal ordinances, traffic violations, and civil
suits where the damages involve less than a certain amount of money (usu-
ally $1,000 or less). In criminal matters, they hear misdemeanors such as
shoplifting, disorderly conduct, or simple assault. Their sanctioning power is
also limited. In criminal matters, punishments may be limited to fines, com-
munity sentencing, or incarceration in the county jail for up to a year. In
addition to their trial work, limited jurisdiction courts conduct arraignments,
preliminary, and bail hearings in felony cases (before they are transferred to
superior courts).
Some states separate limited courts into those that handle civil cases only
and those that settle criminal cases. Included in the category of courts of lim-
ited jurisdiction are special courts, such as juvenile, family, and probate
(divorce, estate issues, and custody) courts. State lawmakers may respond to
state courts of limited
jurisdiction
Generic term
referring to courts that have
jurisdiction over misdemeanors
and conduct preliminary investi-
gations of felony charges.
53247_08_Ch08_p237-271 pp3.indd 241
11/15/07 1:05:41 PM
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P
ART
3
Courts and Adjudication
M
ike Nifong was the Durham County prosecutor when members of
the Duke University lacrosse team were accused of rape. At first,
Nifong was hailed as a hero, a local prosecutor who had the guts
to go after rich white males and bring them to justice for raping a poor
black woman. As the case began to unwind, Nifong was accused of
being out of control, a prosecutor exploiting racial tensions with a
trumped-up charge. The players’ claims of innocence were supported by
DNA tests and other exculpatory evidence, and all charges were eventu-
ally dropped. What really happened in the case? Critics suggest that
Nifong was up for reelection and one of his opponents was African
American. His conduct of the case was an attempt to gain votes in the
black community at the expense of justice. Nifong’s action will long be
debated, and this tale of wrongful prosecution will haunt the justice sys-
tem for quite some time. On December 28, 2006, the North Carolina bar
filed ethics charges against Nifong accusing him of making public state-
ments that were “prejudicial to the administration of justice” and of
engaging in “conduct involving dishonesty, fraud, deceit, or misrepresen-
tation.” On January 24, 2007, the North Carolina State Bar filed more
charges against Nifong for withholding evidence, a “systematic abuse of
prosecutorial discretion . . . prejudicial to the administration of justice.”
Nifong was eventually required to serve a short jail term.
8 COURTS,
PROSECUTION,
AND THE DEFENSE
9 PRETRIAL
PROCEDURES
10 THE CRIMINAL
TRIAL
11 PUNISHMENT AND
SENTENCING
The Duke rape case is one of a number of notorious cases that the U.S.
court system handles each year. In some instances, they receive the full
course of rights and processes guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution. In
others, prosecutors curtail their actions for want of evidence or because
a plea bargain has been struck. The chapters in this section cover the
court process. Chapter 8 reviews the structure of the courts and the role
of the judge, prosecution, and defense. Chapter 9 analyzes the pretrial
stage, including bail and plea bargaining. Chapter 10 covers the process
of the criminal trial and the legal rules that give it structure. Chapter 11
looks at criminal sentencing, including capital punishment.
■
237
53247_08_Ch08_p237-271 pp3.indd 237
11/15/07 1:05:38 PM
C
HAPTER
8
238
THE POLICE AND LAW ENFORCEMENT
Courts, Prosecution, and
the Defense
Chapter Outline
State Courts
Courts of Limited Jurisdiction
Courts of General Jurisdiction
Appellate Courts
Federal Courts
U.S. District Courts
U.S. Courts of Appeals
The U.S. Supreme Court
How a Case Gets to the Supreme Court
Federal and State Court Caseloads
The Judiciary
The Judge and the Justice System
Judicial Qualifications
The Prosecutor
Types of Prosecutors
Prosecutorial Discretion
Factors Influencing Prosecutorial
Discretion
The Role of Prosecutorial Discretion
Prosecutorial Ethics
The Defense Attorney
The Role of the Criminal Defense
Attorney
The Right to Counsel
Legal Services for the Indigent
The Private Bar
Does Type of Lawyer Matter?
The Competence of Defense Attorneys
Court Administration
Using Technology in Court Management
238
53247_08_Ch08_p237-271 pp3.indd 238
11/15/07 1:05:38 PM
239
POLICE IN SOCIETY: HISTORY AND ORGANIZATION
Chapter Objectives
1. Be familiar with the role of the court in
the justice process
2. Recognize the varying structures of
state and federal court systems
3. Understand the problems of court
overload
4. Describe the selection and duties of
the trial judge
5. Discuss the role and duties of
prosecutors
6. Be familiar with the pros and cons of
prosecutorial discretion
7. Understand the role of the defense
attorney in the justice process
8. Discuss the different forms of indigent
defense
9. Debate the pros and cons of private
attorneys
10. Be familiar with the expanding role of
technology in the court process
Key Themes
The court system is quite complex, and
each state has a unique court system.
The problem of court overload is a result
of the increase in legal cases outstripping
the court system’s ability to expand.
Selecting and retaining judges may be
more difficult than imagined.
Prosecutors maintain a great deal of dis-
cretion, most of which is hidden from the
general public they serve.
Though private attorneys get all the press,
most cases are handled by the indigent
defense system.
COBL
Profile
T
IM BAKKEN received his B.S. with majors
in English and psychology from the Univ-
ersity of Wisconsin–Stevens Point and
then went on to earn his J.D. (
juris doctor
)
in law and a master’s degree in counseling
from the University of Wisconsin–Madison.
After law school, Tim became an assistant
district attorney in New York City (Kings County/
Brooklyn), where he specialized in homicide pros-
ecutions. He enjoyed the adversarial system,
arguing with defense lawyers in court and
during trials, and was awed by his respon-
sibilities. A mistake could have grave
239
53247_08_Ch08_p237-271 pp3.indd 239
11/15/07 1:05:40 PM
240
PART 3
COURTS AND ADJUDICATION
consequences, as the smallest error could result in
someone evading justice and committing serious crimes
or in an innocent person going to prison.
After serving as a prosecutor, Tim worked for a law
firm in New York and then decided to pursue a career
teaching law. He enjoyed writing and creating, an essential
component of a professor’s career, as well as interac-
tions with students and professors. But his job is a little
different from most, because he teaches law at the U.S.
Military Academy at West Point. The mission of the
institution is to prepare students for service as officers
in the army and then for a “lifetime of service to the
nation.” The students he now teaches are somewhat
atypical from other college students because the
government covers all their expenses and even pays
them a salary. After graduation, all West Point students
must serve five years in the army, and all of them will
serve one or more tours in Iraq or Afghanistan.
Tim Bakken’s career illustrates the variety of options open to people who
choose legal careers. Some may start as public defenders and then go on to
the private sector, or—as in Tim’s case—move from prosecution to legal educa-
tion. Regardless of their career paths, most attorneys cut their teeth within the
court system.
The criminal court is the setting in which many of the most important
decisions in the criminal justice system are made. Eyewitness identification,
bail, trial, plea negotiations, and sentencing all involve court-made decisions.
The criminal court is a complex social agency with many independent but
interrelated subsystems: administrator, prosecutor, defense attorney, judge,
and probation department. The entire process—from filing the initial com-
plaint to final sentencing of the defendant—is governed by precise rules of law
designed to ensure fairness. However, in today’s crowded court system, such
abstract goals are often impossible to achieve. The nation’s court system is
chronically underbudgeted, and recent economic downturns have not helped
matters.
These constraints have a significant impact on the way courts carry out
justice. Quite often, the U.S. court system is the scene of accommodation and
“working things out,” rather than an arena for a vigorous criminal defense.
Plea negotiations and other nonjudicial alternatives, such as diversion, are far
more common than the formal trial process. Consequently, U.S. criminal jus-
tice can be selective. Discretion accompanies defendants through every step of
the process, determining what will happen to them and how their cases will
be resolved. “Discretion” means that two people committing similar crimes
may receive highly dissimilar treatment; most people convicted of homicide
receive a prison sentence, but about 5 percent receive probation as a sole sen-
tence; indeed, more murderers get probation than the death penalty.
1
In this chapter, we examine the structure and function of the court system.
The U.S. court system has evolved over the years into an intricately balanced
legal process. To house this complex process, each state maintains its own
state court organization and structure, and the federal court has an indepen-
dent trial court system. These are described next.
53247_08_Ch08_p237-271 pp3.indd 240
11/15/07 1:05:41 PM
241
CHAPTER 8
COURTS, PROSECUTION, AND THE DEFENSE
Mary Winkler talks with lead attorney Steve Farese, Sr.,
before being sentenced on June 8, 2007, in Selmer,
Tennessee. Winkler was convicted of voluntary
manslaughter for killing her preacher husband,
Matthew, in the parsonage where the family lived.
According to her statement, Mary and her husband had
been arguing throughout the evening about many
things, including family finances. She admitted some of
the problems were “her fault.” Furthermore, she said,
“He had really been on me lately criticizing me for
things—the way I walk, I eat, everything. It was just
building up to a point. I was tired of it. I guess I got to a
point and snapped.” The judge on the case sentenced
Mary Winkler to 210 days in prison. Because Mary was
credited for already serving 5 months, the judge
permitted her to spend the remaining 60 days in the
Western State Mental Health Facility. Is this sentence
sufficient for the murder of a spouse? Compare it with
the case of Scott Peterson, who received life in prison.
How can such disparity be justified?
STATE COURTS
Every state maintains its own court system. States are free to create as many
courts as they wish, name courts what they like (in New York, felony courts
are known as supreme courts!), and establish specialized courts that handle a
single legal matter, such as drug courts and/or domestic courts. Consequently,
no two court organizations are exactly alike. State courts handle a wide vari-
ety of cases and regulate numerous personal behaviors ranging from homicide
to property maintenance.
A great site for
court-related infor-
mation is the
National
Center for State Courts
.
Most state court sys-
tems have their own website;
Virginia’s state court system
and the National Center for
State Courts website can be
accessed via academic.cengage.
com/criminaljustice/siegel.
Courts of Limited Jurisdiction
Depending on the jurisdiction in which they are located,
state courts of
limited jurisdiction
are known by a variety of names—municipal courts,
county courts, district courts, and metropolitan courts, to name but a few.
They are known as courts of limited jurisdiction because they are restricted to
hearing minor or less serious civil and criminal cases.
Usually, courts of limited jurisdiction handle misdemeanor criminal
infractions, violations of municipal ordinances, traffic violations, and civil
suits where the damages involve less than a certain amount of money (usu-
ally $1,000 or less). In criminal matters, they hear misdemeanors such as
shoplifting, disorderly conduct, or simple assault. Their sanctioning power is
also limited. In criminal matters, punishments may be limited to fines, com-
munity sentencing, or incarceration in the county jail for up to a year. In
addition to their trial work, limited jurisdiction courts conduct arraignments,
preliminary, and bail hearings in felony cases (before they are transferred to
superior courts).
Some states separate limited courts into those that handle civil cases only
and those that settle criminal cases. Included in the category of courts of lim-
ited jurisdiction are special courts, such as juvenile, family, and probate
(divorce, estate issues, and custody) courts. State lawmakers may respond to
state courts of limited
jurisdiction
Generic term
referring to courts that have
jurisdiction over misdemeanors
and conduct preliminary investi-
gations of felony charges.
53247_08_Ch08_p237-271 pp3.indd 241
11/15/07 1:05:41 PM
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]